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Hearst tried to suppress the film, seeing aspects of his own life through the dramatic screen; he even tried to buy prints of the film to burn them, but was ultimately unsuccessful. The film was not a box office hit, though, because it flaunted so many Hollywood conventions, including telling the story out of chronological order. Although audiences were confused, critics saw its potential and a decade and a half later it was resurrected by the New Wave film critics to raise it to masterpiece status. Andrew Sarris said Citizen Kane "influenced the cinema more profoundly than any American film since D.W. Griffith's Birth of a Nation." But after Kane, Welles had nowhere to go but downhill. In fact, he would never get carte blanche again, because he would never have the box office success that warrants such treatment.

After the success of Citizen Kane, Welles announced that he would film the life of Christ next. But, wanting to avoid scandal, studio heads steered him instead toward his safer next project, The Magnificent Ambersons, based on a Booth Tarkington novel. However, budget overruns caused the studio to regain control over the creative content of the picture, and they changed it entirely. Although still hailed as a masterpiece, those involved with the production have hinted at the majesty of the film that almost was.

The poster from one of his best films

Shortly thereafter, Welles also directed the masterpiece of film noir titled Lady from Shanghai (1948), which featured the famous surrealistic hall of mirrors scene that has been imitated in many subsequent films. The notoriously convoluted plot involves a seaman who is framed for a murder he did not commit. He is defended by a lawyer who may be the murderer himself. Again audiences were confused, although critics admired Welles' tongue-in-cheek approach to the narrative.

Instead of filming the life of Christ, Welles narrated the gospel story in the 1950s for Americana Audio, a recording which was recently rediscovered and re-mastered. Also recently unearthed, Alfred Hitchcock once planned a movie called Suspense, a draft of which was recently found, in which he intended to have Welles play Christ in a modern day retelling of the gospel story, but again this project never saw the light of day, perhaps because the producers got cold feet in those less controversial times. Welles did later narrate the Jesus story in 1962's King of Kings, and did some writing and voice-over for John Huston's 1966 film The Bible.

Welles often acted in others' films to pay for the films he wanted to make. (Ironically, near the end of his life, and despite his left-wing political views, he narrated The Late, Great Planet Earth, the fundamentalist Christian documentary about the end times). Another acknowledged masterpiece was 1958's Touch of Evil, which he started work on merely as an actor, but eventually directed as well, at actor Charles Heston's insistence. The story of a drug enforcement officer on the Mexican border, Welles raised it to the level of suspense to rival Hitchcock's greatest works. Often cited as one of the last great film noir classics, the opening credit two-minute sequence one-shot of a man putting a bomb in the trunk of a car, ending with the bomb exploding as the credits end, is a masterful piece of cinema. Yet the film later also takes full advantage of Eisensteinian cutting to raise tension to unbearable limits.

Welles was a full-bodied Falstaff late in life

Around this time, Welles also started one of his greatest Shakespearian adaptations: Chimes at Midnight, which draws upon five of the History plays that involve Falstaff, the rotund, hilarious, yet tragic character of the Bard's early plays. Welles called Falstaff the "best role Shakespeare ever wrote." He continues, "If Shakespeare had done nothing but that magnificent creation, it would suffice to make him immortal."

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